


A Fair Trade (The Crayak's Greed Remix)

by mademoisellePlume



Category: Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-10
Updated: 2014-02-10
Packaged: 2018-01-11 20:10:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1177416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mademoisellePlume/pseuds/mademoisellePlume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A different way for a war to end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Fair Trade (The Crayak's Greed Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Only the dead have seen the end of the war.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/801621) by [JustAnotherGhostwriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustAnotherGhostwriter/pseuds/JustAnotherGhostwriter). 



> This is a remix JUST of chapter SEVEN.

We walked home, tired beyond belief. My shoulders were slumped like they almost always were these days.

A long time ago, I didn't know what it felt like to have this sort of responsibility on my shoulders. To feel them be weighed down by the lives of my friends, by the loss of my family, by all the expectations of me.

It seemed like forever since my biggest worries were nothing more than how well Marco was coping with the loss of his mom and if I was going to get onto the basketball team like Tom had.

In one decision to try and rescue my brother, I had taken on the responsibility that now crushed me. And now I don't really believe I'll even save him. And not only have I failed in that, I couldn't even keep my parents safe.

The only people I can ever save are the five trailing along behind me, exhausted and emotionally battered by one of the worst battles we had ever been in. I had a space between me and them, between the one that barked out orders and the ones who listened. 

I'd hate me, if I was them. I don't know why they still want me to be the leader. I feel brittle and broken with everything I've lost. But I guess we've all lost too much. I worry about us all, if we survive the war. 

Cassie was crying. I was as intensely aware of that as I was that there was no way I could comfort her.

There were a hundred times each of them might have died today. A hundred close calls. Blood spilled, organs rent, limbs torn. We survived today. We always survive, if barely. We drag ourselves away to lick our wounds and put ourselves back together. 

And it's just _wonderful_ to do it amongst the adults. I see their looks, I hear their words even when they aren't spoken. Doubting us. Doubting _me_. 

I wonder what my parents would have said if we'd saved them as well. 

“Oh, this is just _lovely_. Look at all of you. This is _delightful_.”

We move to look as quickly as we can, everyone ready to morph or lunge at the threat. I think I knew it was the Drode before I saw him sitting on a branch and cackling at the sight of Tobias' wings flared and Ax's tail raised. The only two immediate threats, as the rest of us were just exhausted teenagers.

“What do you want?” Of course it was Rachel demanding that.

“I want to watch. I want to watch all of you walk home in despair. It’s so much fun. The mighty Animorphs. Earth’s final hope. I’ve seen kicked dogs looking better than you.” The personal servant dog of Crayak ought to know, I thought, his words touching a nerve.

“If you don’t go away, I’ll make sure you don’t see _anything_ any more,” my vicious cousin threatened.

The Drode just laughed, as it always did. “Oh, Rachel. Oh, Rachel, how I _like_ _you_. I’ll say it again: you always were my favourite. And yet, right now you’re just like all the others. Every one of you is defeated and hollow. Lost souls. All of you are thinking the same miserable, weak thoughts.” The Drode looked at me with its awful smile. “All of you are questioning your _precious_ leader. Tut tut! So ruthless are your thoughts!”

My face stayed blank. I'd suspected as much, hadn't I? No need for hurt, so I could ignore that little piece of myself that resented them all for fitting me with this burden. “Go back to your master, Drode,” I said with perfect quietness and firmness, ignoring how my friends betrayed the truth to the creatures' words with the way they held themselves, the way they looked. I questioned myself. The adults questioned me. Doubting the sixteen year old boy with dead eyes was just an affirmation that we were all sane.

Whining, the Drode complained as if any of us cared. “I really don’t want to. He’ll be so mad that you all survived. He sent me here so he could have an eyewitness account of your deaths. But none of you _died_. My glorious master hates it when you fail to die.”

“Give him our condolences,” my best friend drawled. He turned to walk away again, and we followed suit, beginning our weary march again. The Drode was undiscouraged, following along the branch.

“It will come soon. Don’t you worry. Soon I will be able to bring good news to my powerful master. Soon he shall be pleased. It’s only a matter of time.” Rachel snarled, and I might not have told her to stop if Cassie hadn't grabbed her wrist to keep her moving. “The great Crayak will feel sorry for _your_ death, Rachel. You’re such wasted power amongst these doomed children who play at being warriors.”

Rachel's fury was almost palpable. But then she huffed and stopped resisting Cassie's efforts to keep her walking. Cassie didn't let go, her knuckles white, and she was probably getting some comfort out of having someone to hold onto as she kept pulling Rachel away from trouble.

“To be honest, he won’t care much about the others. Perhaps the anomaly’s death shall give him passing interest, but that is all. You will just be ants that were stepped on. Four ants, one warrior who sadly wasted her potential, and one dog who dared try to defy him.” The Drode's tone changed, the smugness of his tone turning to dripping venom. “The great and masterful Crayak will fill the heavens with his pleasure the day you die, Jake."

“Yeah, I kinda got that, thanks," I called back, not turning, my feet continuing to carry me forwards.

With a nasty laugh, the Drode said, "oh, little puny human _boy_. You have no idea how much the great Crayak wants you dead."

I took a step. Just another taunt. Another step. He wanted a reaction, and I wasn't going to give it to him. A third step. But... what if it was the truth? What if he meant it?

I was spinning around to look at the Drode, my face feeling strange, my heart in my throat. "How much? How badly does Crayak want me dead?"

My weary friends didn't say a thing, didn't twitch, didn't breathe, just stared at me, their expressions locked in confusion and distaste.

Time had been stopped, clearly.

Well, I guess that meant we were in business.

"That's an interesting question, Big Jake." The Drode observed in a languid tone, beady eyes gleaming in the pale light of this miserable evening.

"It's got a more interesting answer."

"Are you that tired of the war, human? Of all the hard choices? All the hard losses?"

I looked down and inspected my nails. "Not so tired that I won't keep holding on to this fight with every last breath. Not so tired I won't have plenty more air to breath." This wasn't something to be lighthearted about but somehow the pressure on my shoulder slacked a little. If I could do this, how simple things could be. One life for my friends. One life for our families. One life for our town. One life for our world. How cheaply could peace be priced?

It was never self-sacrifice I had a problem with, after all.

"But you'll die, to end the war." The Drode said, laying the terms flat on the table.

I nodded and the movement was stiff and tight, my hands folding into fists. But the offer, the idea, it lit hope in my heart and made it hard not to smile. "I die. Me. Not them. They have to survive. Our families survive. The Auxiliaries survive."

"You're very sure they wouldn't want to perish by your side."

"They'll get over it. Like you said, weren't they just questioning me? Aren't they seeing I was a poor choice of leader?" I spread my arms, my fingers smarting as I uncurled my fists. "What do you care? I'm offering myself up to you and your master. Big Jake, the ruthless Animorph, the leader of the pack of kicked dogs, the one who defeated the Howlers. I could find a silver platter for you, but that might take some time."

The Drode made a little sound of thoughtfulness, cocking its overlarge head to the side. "Just savoring the moment. My Master will be very pleased, if this isn't some treacherous little piece of deception. "

"I'm tricking you with an idea that you planted in my head? I should be accusing you of tricking me," I said incredulously. "Just agree, and let's get on with it. Or you could refuse and suffer Crayak's wrath."

"You don't think we'd want to get it over with too soon, do you little Jake?" It was Crayak's voice, though I saw no sign of the dedicated Eye of Sauron cosplayer.

I fold my arms back in, lifting my head and ignoring the way my bones buzzed with the sense of Crayak's presence. "After how long you've desperately wanted me dead? Kind of, yeah. What happened to your pleasure filling the heavens, et cetera? Can a red eye get blue balls?"

"Oh, believe me, seeing your soul flee the trappings of human flesh will satisfy me greatly, human. But not here. Not now."

"Then when?"

"You'll know."

“Little worm,” Rachel snarled. “I should have killed him ages ago.”

Everything had unfrozen and I was turning and walking back to camp. The bargain had been struck. Cassie and Marco questioned how the air looked in that compressed moment, and I told them to ignore it. And they did.

Sometimes they doubted me, but they would always obey me.

In returning to camp, I tried to decide if I should say some sort of goodbye.

If we'd saved my parents, maybe when we returned I would have told them something vague that they would have known later was a goodbye to them. But no adult there really needed or cared to have any sort of mysterious not-goodbye shoved at them, not even Aunt Naomi.

And even a hint of a goodbye to any of my friends would prompt them to reconsider the Drode's strangeness today.

Well, if I had died in any battle, there would have been no goodbye. There wasn't really a reason to make a special one now that I had made a fair trade.

I knew the next battle was the last about halfway through. The Yeerks went to pieces. We had killed too many. Some ran. Some gave up. Some gave up everything. We had won, finally, after wearing our souls down to the thinnest remnants of what we had been.

Alloran and his hated tormentor that had controlled him for so long lay dead, not far from where Tobias perched.

That, more than anything, told me that the war was finished.

I think I was smiling, cradled in the arms of Cassie and Marco, Rachel holding onto me tightly. I tried to tell them that they should smile too, that they should be happy that I hadn't needed to order any of them to their deaths. I wanted to tell them to take care of each other and Tom.

But after all, victory had its price. And I was not so important, not now that the war was over with. They would all see that, given time.

**Author's Note:**

> It took me FOREVER to find a fic of Ghosty's I could put a good twist on. Then I read chapter seven of 'Only the dead have seen the end of war' and I realized that I badly wanted to write Jake bartering his life away. Done for the Animorphs Remix Challenge!


End file.
